“Time will get us all, but it’s cornered me earlier than I hoped. Every professional sportsperson always hopes to be able to leave their chosen sport on their terms but too often that’s not the case.

“I have had to take on board the medical advice that I have been given and after talking to Sheena and my family, I have taken the difficult decision to retire with immediate effect from playing rugby in order to ensure my future well being.

“I’m very proud to finish my career as a one club man having played amongst some of the best in the game, who are all like a family of brothers to me.

“My goal when I started my professional career 14 years ago was to leave the jerseys that I wore in a better place and I hope I have done that.

“Thank you to the IRFU, Leinster Rugby, all the coaches, medical staff, back room staff, sponsors, media, supporters and most importantly my wife, family, friends and fellow players for helping me to make my dreams come true.

“I’ve had the time of my life on and off the rugby pitch but now it’s time for the next chapter.”

That’s more down to people above Ryle’s pay grade though. The reason it’s in a bad state is that they didn’t cough up for the RWC,the 6N and sky outbid them for the GAA they have. I’m not sure whats behind their loss of certain premierleague games.

In fairness, they have a weekly LOI show as well as a weekly rugby show on top of their GAA coverage and that’s more than what they had when I were a lad. Their promo+VT was streets ahead of what TV3 are doing. In fact in previous years it’s been better than what BBC were doing for rugby.

Ahhhh cringe I thought of this earlier today. They were bff’s for a while. Do you remember when Heaslip had was man of the match in a 6 nations decider a few years back and harbo was trying to take some sort of credit on twitter? It seemed like he had a few on board and was flat out with the jibberish all evening but somehow managed to pat himself on the back for Ireland winning the 6 nations..he inspired Jamie +Jamie inspired team+team won=harbo won the 6 nations was the logic as far as I remember